this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2025
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[โ€“] stingpie@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

You make a good point. I'm interested to know how old you are, because the 'correct' way to teach math has been debated for 70ish years New math was introduced in the 50's, and emphasized the understanding of how base-10 works. This is commonly mistaken for common core math,which put even more emphasis on understanding the procedures used for math rather than the right answer. When I grew up, addition was mainly based in new math, whereas multiplication was introduced as successive addition, but was mostly focused on memorizing tables.

[โ€“] paultimate14@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

I'm in my 30's. Just barely missed Common Core but I remember hearing parents with younger children complaining about it. I don't remember the math I was taught having any specific branding with it, though it may have been a late variant of New Math.

What I was taught in schools definitely still had a lot of memorization involved. I consider myself lucky that my sister taught me earlier, because I saw a lot of my bright peers struggle with the way it was taught in schools. I never had to study math outside of school for my entire academic career. She helped me to understand computers (she also taught me binary, octal, and hexadecimal systems. Hexadecimal is very useful for a kid with a GameShark and Pokemon).